DTIC ADA594672: Rebalancing US Military Power

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A P t
mericAn ower in rAnsition
Rebalancing US Military Power
Anna Simons
© 2013 Anna Simons
AbstrAct: For all the attention paid to partnering, too little goes into
what “partnering” might mean from ostensible partners’ points of
view. In the 21st century, sensitivities and sensibilities matter. So do
economic realities. The US military should make better strategic use
of military advisors to help foreign security services professional-
ize—something the United States can only do if foreign militaries
are willing to engage in civic action themselves.
I
n the wake of resurgent terrorism, withdrawals from Iraq and
Afghanistan, and massive budget cuts, defense intellectuals and
members of the military alike increasingly discuss the need to shape,
partner, and advise foreign forces.1 Or, as LTG Charles Cleveland and
LTC Stuart Faris write, “America’s land forces should look to develop a
global landpower network. This network would consist of allies, expedi-
tionary global and regional partners, and host-nation forces.”2 The goal?
To secure US national interests indirectly, inexpensively, and without
putting large numbers of “boots on the ground.”
White House, too, underscores security sector assistance. Its aim
is to:
• Help partner nations build the sustainable capacity to address common
security challenges.
• Promote partner support for US interests.
• Promote universal values.
• Strengthen collective security and multinational defense arrange-
ments and organizations.3
However, there are at least four flaws in our collective approach.
First, its prescriptions are all about “us” and US-centric needs,
thereby taking for granted others’ needs. Second, the list reflects little
understanding of what “partnering” might mean to America’s osten-
sible partners—in fact, it reveals just the opposite. Third, it suggests the
United States will continue to pursue the same old strategies that have
already served it so poorly. Finally, it diverts the United States from
what should be its main goal abroad: other countries’ development of
their own incorruptible, apolitical security services—a goal that is an
either-or (it can or cannot be done) proposition, and not something, as
many suppose, that takes decades to achieve.
1 See Jennifer Morrison Taw, Mission Revolution: The U.S. Military and Stability Operations (New
York: Columbia University Press, 2012), for an excellent overview of the promises and pitfalls of
Dr. Anna Simons is a
stability operations, and debates from various US perspectives.
Professor of Defense Analysis
2 LTG Charles Cleveland and LTC Stuart Faris, “Toward Strategic Landpower,” Army, July 2013, at the US Naval Postgraduate
23. School, and co-author of
3 The White House, Office of the Press Secretary, Fact Sheet: U.S. Security Sector The Sovereignty Solution: A
Assistance Policy, April 5, 2013, http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2013/04/05/ Commonsense Approach to Global
fact-sheet-us-security-sector-assistance-policy Security.
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For all the attention paid to partnering, too little goes into what ?partnering? might mean from ostensible
partners? points of view. In the 21st century, sensitivities and sensibilities matter. So do economic realities.
The US military should make better strategic use of military advisors to help foreign security services
professionalize?something the United States can only do if foreign militaries are willing to engage in civic
action themselves.
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ABSTRACT OF PAGES RESPONSIBLE PERSON
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36 Parameters 43(4) Winter 2013-14
Because some interagency “stakeholders” object to the word “pro-
fessionalize”—in their view it is demeaning and insulting to suggest
other forces are not already professional—in this article, the term
“professional” refers to incorruptible, apolitical security services.4 The
argument is that when security services are incorruptible, states hold
together. India is an example. Few countries contain more sectarian
divides, or have had to wrestle with a greater variety of insurgency. Yet,
India’s armed forces have remained apolitical and professional. This is
not just a legacy of British imperialism, since other South Asian countries
were woven from the same cloth. Rather, India remains a vibrant pluralist
democracy thanks to, among other things, the armed forces’ commit-
ment to behaving apolitically and according to meritocratic principles.5
In contrast, regimes in many countries are not just corrupt, but
rulers send members of the security services to do their coercing and
compelling for them. Unfortunately, all it takes is the collusion of some
high-ranking members of the army, police, gendarmerie, or other secu-
rity services for leaders to engage in venal behavior. Or, to put none too
fine a point on it, whenever people in uniform do politicians’ personal
bidding and act as their willing muscle, they subvert the state. On the
other hand, when members of the security services refuse to engage in
intimidation or coercion on behalf of politicians, and refuse to behave
like thugs, those in power find it extremely difficult, if not impossible,
to compel people against their will.
Security services that protect rather than undermine the state’s integ-
rity are not just vital to a country’s stability, but apolitical, incorruptible
armed forces are also essential to protecting those other two institutions
that help guarantee responsible, responsive governance: the judiciary and
the media. In fact, try to build any institution of state without first secur-
ing the integrity of the armed forces and you will only end up pouring
good money after bad—something the United States has been doing
abroad for decades.6
Meanwhile, professionalization is a straightforward proposition. It
does not require a whole-of-government approach—at least not by Amer-
icans. It is neither complicated nor costly, although it also is not always
possible, to achieve. To gauge whether it is possible requires, first, advisors
of the right stature and mindset. Second, general officers in Washington
and at the combatant commands have to be willing to take advisors’
assessments seriously and convey them truthfully to policymakers.
Americans make a mistake whenever we underestimate the political
acuity of non-Western allies and adversaries.7 Today, most non-Western-
ers in positions of authority are more familiar with us than we are with
them, a late 20th century inversion that holds profound implications for
4 There is now a vast literature discussing professions and professionalism. See Jessica Groves,
Lily McGovern, and Tim Baker, comps., Military Professionalism: An Annotated Bibliography on the
Nature and Ethos of the Military Profession (Washington, DC: Institute for National Security, Ethics,
and Leadership (INSEL), National Defense University Library, December 2010). http://www.usafa.
edu/superintendent/diversityoffice/links/MilitaryProfessionalismBibliography.pdf
5 Of course, the fact that Pakistan and China both loom as real threats has also contributed.
6 For more on the effects of aid, see Anna Simons, Joe McGraw, and Duane Lauchengco,
“Chapter 7” in The Sovereignty Solution: A Commonsense Approach to Global Security (Annapolis: Naval
Institute Press, 2011).
7 For the full argument, see Anna Simons, 21st Century Cultures of War: Advantage Them (FPRI
e-book, 2012). https://www.fpri.org/docs/Simons_21st_Century_Cultures_of_War.pdf
AmericAn Power in TrAnsiTion Simons 37
advising and partnering in the 21st century.8 Indeed, those who think
a 10- or 20,000 person advisory corps, or partnering as we conceive it,
are suitable counters to terrorism or insurgency display little more their
own unsophistication about the non-West. Forget, too, T. E. Lawrence
as a role model—his methods remain shrouded in controversy. What
stability and security require instead is working by, with, and through
professionalized security services.
Advising
Consider the history of successful military advising—with success
defined as both parties getting what they need out of the relationship—
and it should quickly become apparent that mass-producing advisory
skills is a contradiction in terms.9 Interpersonal chemistry matters. So do
attributes like humor, patience, wile, and the ability to influence without
manipulation. There is no evidence that any of these are trainable skills,
or that such traits are as common as most proponents of advising mis-
sions seem to think. Instead, their combination is rather rare.
The history of successful military advising shows a distinct arc,
one that coincides better with the shift in who understands what about
whom. This arc is perhaps best described using the default lens of familial
relations. Parent-child, sibling, and spousal relations can be considered
default relations not only because they are the relations most familiar to
most people, but because they also comprise the basic bio-grammar for
how we humans interact.10
In parent-child relations, parents dominate and typically command
respect. As children age, authority may chafe and youth might eventu-
ally rebel, but fealty should endure.
When it comes to siblings, older brothers and sisters are in a posi-
tion of literal (if not figurative) dominance, at least initially. As younger
siblings mature, they often attempt to escape their elders’ thumb or
shadow, and what had been respect can turn to resentment. Over time,
younger siblings usually expect to be treated as equals, though they
never will be equals from their elders’ perspective.
Meanwhile, in healthy marriages, spouses are co-equals despite, if
not because of, their differences. Couples share a division of labor (even
if unevenly), and though one spouse will doubtless be better at certain
things, and will likely dominate in certain areas, in stable marriages
neither individual will be judged as superior in all things.
8 This is a literal truism if one just considers the number of heads of state who speak English
and at least one other language vs. their American counterparts.
9 Not even everyone in the US Army Special Forces (SF) is suited to be a military advisor,
though SF selection comes closer than any other to screening individuals with advisor-like skills. I
write this based on extensive discussions over the past 15 years in my Military Advisor class, as well
as field observations in Iraq and Afghanistan. At the same time, I need to be clear: a 10,000-person
corps might well be capable of training foreign forces. But training is to a standard, and is far easier
for young marines, soldiers, and others to accomplish than is advising, which requires context-
dependent judgment.
10 I am borrowing and stretching Lionel Tiger and Robin Fox’s notion of bio-grammar from
The Imperial Animal (New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1971). Or, as Edward Schein notes,
“As Freud pointed out long ago, one of the models we bring to any new group situation is our
own model of family, the group in which we spent most of our early life,” Organizational Culture and
Leadership, 3rd ed. (New York: Jossey-Bass, 2004),124.
38 Parameters 43(4) Winter 2013-14
Advisory relationships often bear a resemblance to one, two, or arc
across all three, of those categories, and can morph or evolve (and even
devolve) over time. For instance, American advisors in the jungles of
World War II actually led more often than they advised, but by Vietnam
they commanded less and worked with the “indig” more. In contrast,
few populations today are unfamiliar with Western influences. Advisees
tend to expect reciprocity at a minimum.
Two obvious points are worth drawing here. First, both parties in a
relationship will not necessarily view it similarly. And expectations will
differ cross-culturally. For instance, while marriages in the West tend to
be marriages of choice, officers from Jordan and Pakistan have pointed
out how similar advisory relations are to arranged marriages; most advi-
sors and advisees have no choice about who they are partnered with
and have to learn how to accommodate one another if they want the
partnership to work.11
Thanks to the culturally specific ways humans have been raised to
treat those who remind them of parents, siblings, or spouses, there is a
strong likelihood that counterparts without deep cross-cultural famil-
iarity will misread one another, to include misreading one another’s
misreadings.12 Alternatively, too much time spent together can pose dif-
ferent problems. For instance, sometimes when people know each other
too well they bridle at not receiving the respect they feel they deserve.
Two examples would be former allies in Eritrea and Ethiopia or Uganda
and Rwanda. Over the course of long liberation struggles, leaders and
insurgents in both sets of countries developed sibling-like dependencies,
with Eritrea’s Isaias Afewerki relying on but also helping to build Meles
Zenawi’s insurgent forces and Uganda’s Youweri Museveni relying on
and helping to incubate Fred Rwigyema‘s and Paul Kagame’s Rwandan
Patriotic Front (RPF). Years later, both ended up in bitter wars with
one another.
While it seems only human that dependence should degenerate into
outright hostility on occasion, the real source of the problem with asym-
metry is superiority.13 It may be impossible for individuals in an advisory
role not to regard themselves as superior to those they are advising. Not
only does the very fact of having something to impart mean one oper-
ates from a position of strength (if not authority), but the more one has
to offer and the more deference one receives, the more special treatment
one expects.
Another facet of inherent inequality is that treating titular coun-
terparts as equals is easy when they are liked and admired. It feels
more hypocritical and corrosive when they are not. But under either
11 In the wake of Saudi Arabia’s October 2013 rejection of a UN Security Council seat, consider:
“Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al Faisal is fond of saying that the US and Saudi Arabia no longer have
a Catholic marriage, but rather a Muslim one. This is a clever way of saying that Saudi Arabia and
the US are not faithful to each other. In the absence of any major-power alternative to the US, for
the Saudis in this Muslim marriage, the US may well remain Wife No. 1. Even if she is not about to
be divorced, however, the Saudis are clearly declaring a trial separation.” See Karen Elliott House,
“Behind the Saudi-U.S. Breakup,” The Wall Street Journal, October 25, 2013.
12 Some Americans might insist that talking in terms of family metaphors is ridiculous; the
more useful foil is friendship. They would probably suggest this because, in their view, they always
try to treat others as friends. Yet, in doing so they may also fool themselves since their advisees are
unlikely to share their understanding of friendship, especially since friendship means something
quite different, (and counts for less than family) in many non-Western settings.
13 One actually sees this among social animals across the board, not just among humans.
AmericAn Power in TrAnsiTion Simons 39
circumstance it can be grossly irresponsible to treat people who are not
as good as they think they are as though they are as good as they believe,
since this can set them—and others—up for failure later. For instance,
Lieutenant Colonel John Paul Vann fell into this trap in Vietnam.14
He purposely strengthened the reputation of his counterpart, Colonel
Huynh Van Cao. By publicly crediting Cao for operations he (Vann)
planned, Vann made it impossible to later point out, even to his own
chain of command, that Cao was not as effective as advertised. After
sounding optimistic about the war for months, Vann never could get
higher-ranking officials to heed his reassessment of the conflict. Of
course, cynics might contend that Vann’s approach is simply emblematic
of what happens whenever wars are subjectively recounted.
Looking ahead, it will not just be rhetorical excess that plagues
reporting (and analysis). Among the challenges confronting members
of the US military is to assess how best to work with forces whose sen-
sibilities about their capabilities may well outstrip their actual abilities,
but who are also hyper-sensitive to any slights. This brings us to the
term “partner.” Tellingly, few in Washington have spent sufficient time
examining what the word “partner” might mean from current or likely
future partners’ points of view. Washington has not made clear what
partnership should mean to foreign governments, or to US servicemem-
bers or taxpayers.15
Partnering
Here, then, is one formulation: to succeed, a partnership should
be grounded in mutual indispensability. Anything less creates a depen-
dency, and a dependency is by definition not a partnership.
Partnerships can come in a variety of forms:
• In Partnership Type #1: you are my equal. We are interchangeable, and
our forces can be fully blended.
• In Partnership Type #2: I trust you implicitly. We can agree on a division
of labor. I will be responsible for Sectors A, B, and C; you will be
responsible for Sectors D, E, and F.
• In Partnership Type #3: we are complementary and operate in tandem.
You have skills and capabilities I lack, and vice versa. I will defer
to you for intelligence and local knowledge; you can rely on me for
logistics and medevac.
Historically-speaking, the United States has been involved in all
three types of arrangements; one can find each exemplified somewhere
during World War II. Yet, if one asks how many such arrangements the
United States is involved in today, the honest answer would have to be
that most of its associations are with expedient dependents.
14 Neil Sheehan, A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam (New York: Vintage,
1988).
15 Yet, as COL Alan Shumate notes, “building partner capacity is a critical component of
our future National Security Strategy. These three words appear twenty-five times in the January
2012 Department of Defense publication, “Sustaining U.S. Global Leadership: Priorities for 21st
Century Defense.” Alan Shumate, “Building Partner Capacity in the 21st Century: How the U.S. Can
Succeed,” Small Wars Journal, August 7, 2013.
40 Parameters 43(4) Winter 2013-14
Nor will Washington’s prescription that the US military promote
partner support for US interests successfully redress this situation. Just
the opposite. Not only does prioritizing American interests put the cart
before the horse, it ignores what is needed to keep others’ interests and
US interests aligned for as long as possible, which has always been the
hallmark of successful advising (not to mention partnering). Tackling
local needs should always come first.16
The reason is simple: as a military becomes more capable of address-
ing its security concerns, it builds its capabilities to address Washington’s
concerns—although, ideally, once local forces become sufficiently pro-
fessional bad actors should no longer operate in (or from) that country.17
Of course, professionalization also means members of security services
must be paid a decent wage, receive better than decent conditions of
service, earn a decent retirement, etc. Tellingly, if fair pay and benefits
are not something senior leaders are already striving to secure for their
forces, then that is an indicator in and of itself that the security services’
culture is awry, and professionalism does not exist.
The inescapable reality, again, is that securing security requires
nationally capable— apolitical, incorruptible—armed forces. Stability is
undermined by anything less. So is honest partnership.
Civic Action—The Ultimate Indirect Approach
One problem with the United States’ current approach is that
Washington’s motivations for working with others are proximate: coun-
terterrorism, counterproliferation, counterdrugs, counter-you-name-it.
US forces concentrate on improving local security forces’ abilities to
shoot, move, and communicate, while also admonishing them to not
violate human rights. Washington might hope that these efforts will have
additive effects over time, but the truth is nothing the United States does
will guarantee stability in someone else’s country. That task belongs to
them, while the challenge for the United States should be to determine
whether its putative counterparts have what it takes before Washington
starts investing, rather than after the United States is embroiled.
As for how policymakers might make this determination, consider
civic action. It is the ideal canary in the coal mine. Countries that can
keep civic action alive are countries with which the US military can
work. Countries that cannot, or will not do so, are either beyond US
help or not ready for it.
16 Here is one of the kinds of things that can happen when local needs are not met: apparently
the US did not realize or did not take seriously the fact that the Malian government’s chief concern
was separatists, not AQIM. The separatists’ ability to operate then created the space for AQIM to
move in—and Mali’s current plight and spillover effects throughout the region are one consequence:
“Over time we began to realize that the ATT government was focused not on AQIM as a threat but
rather on Tuaregs in the north,” a senior defense official at the Pentagon told me. “He saw a political
threat and a security threat but not the kind of counter-terrorism threat that we were focused on. I
think that kind of mismatch is part of what was starting to unravel the partnership on [counterter-
rorism] when the coup happened,” Yochi Dreazen, “The New Terrorist Training Ground,” The
Atlantic, October 2013, 66.
17 What I am suggesting is the obverse of the campaign to get Joseph Kony. The Lord’s
Resistance Army is not a pressing security concern for any of the African governments involved.
Rather, it is of keen interest to certain lobbying groups in the US. That makes it the wrong mission to
use for helping depoliticize and uncorrupt regional forces since it is a mission that is more important
to President Obama than to local heads of state or their militaries.
AmericAn Power in TrAnsiTion Simons 41
This assertion is based on a two-part comparison. First, there is civic
action as conceived by Edward Lansdale, advisor to Ramon Magsaysay,
Minister of Defense and then President of the Philippines in the 1950s.
Second, is the comparison one can make between Lansdale’s approach
with what is done today.
Lansdale credits himself with introducing the concept of civic
action to Americans during the Huk Rebellion, one of the few 20th
century insurgencies the United States succeeded in helping to counter.18
According to Lansdale’s and Magsaysay’s definition, civic action consists
of those things a national military can (and should) do to protect rather
than prey on its citizens.
In Lansdale’s and Magsaysay’s view, members of the Philippines
armed forces needed to prove themselves to be of, for, and by the
people—which meant uniformed personnel had to stop extorting
people or accepting bribes. They also had to stop allowing politicians to
corrupt them. At the same time, to prove their trustworthiness, there
were certain things those in uniform could assist with, such as policing
the national elections in 1951. By doing so, soldiers did not just demon-
strate their commitment to protect the integrity of the political system,
but safeguarded a free and fair vote. Indeed, many say the Philippines
has not had as free or fair an election since Magsaysay was tragically
killed in a plane accident in 1957.
Two other things noteworthy about Lansdale’s advisory approach
were that he had very few Americans working with him, and he dis-
bursed very little money. He never bought support. When he did
dispense money, it was for doing clever things against the opposition.
A third critical factor was, of course, Magsaysay.19 Magsaysay was a man
of the people. He was also a compelling leader. One example: he loved
making surprise visits not only to catch slackards off-guard, but to force
the entire military to stay on its toes and self-police, all of which helped
(re)instill pride.
In short, both men’s version of civic action consisted of the Philippine
military proving to citizens its worth as their national (emphasis on the
word “national”) military. What civic action consisted of and who con-
ducted it was totally Filipino-centric.
Now, compare this to what the United States touts and promotes
today. Because Washington likes combining soft approaches and surgi-
cal strikes, it engages in development assistance. Yet, no matter how
good it makes Americans in uniform feel to build a well here, a clinic
there, or a school somewhere else, that kind of unilateral civic action by
the United States adds up to nothing coherent in terms of strengthening
the social contract or the delivery of goods and services by another gov-
ernment to its people. To be sure, school-building, clinic-construction,
18 William R. Polk, Violent Politics: A History of Insurgency, Terrorism, and Guerrilla Warfare, from the
American Revolution to Iraq (New York: HarperCollins, 2007), suggests that William Howard Taft de-
serves credit for civic action: “unconsciously or at least without attribution, Lansdale took Magsaysay
back to the ‘civic action’ policy of William Howard Taft” (51). For Lansdale’s activities, see his own
account: Edward Lansdale, In the Midst of Wars: An American’s Mission to Southeast Asia (New York:
Fordham University Press, 1991).
19 Magsaysay was also noticed because there were Americans who were paying attention. Paying
attention and helping create conditions in which talent has a chance to draw attention early are
exactly what IMET money and JCET should be doing.
42 Parameters 43(4) Winter 2013-14
and well-digging can be important local force protection measures.
Whenever a base is put somewhere, those inhabiting it should want
people in the neighborhood to think well of them, especially since local
residents represent both their first and last local line of defense; the
easiest way to get local residents to think well of them is for those outsid-
ers to do things for the locals.20 Americans in uniform, however, should
not fool themselves. Any such actions they undertake do nothing to
improve the capabilities or image of local forces.
Alternatively, where the United States does not maintain a per-
manent presence, its forces typically support sustainable development
instead, a type of assistance that has been fashionable in aid circles for
quite some time. Yet, projects that do not require periodic American
assistance make little sense for a different reason: after all, if the US
government’s overarching aim is to guarantee access and placement to
counter everything from drugs to weapons of mass destruction (WMD)
proliferation, then surely projects that require periodic maintenance,
spare parts, technical readjustments, and so on would be more prudent
than “fire-and-forget” assistance. One can imagine that if only the mili-
tary were to treat development projects the way it orchestrates foreign
military sales, it would engineer projects specifically designed to need
ongoing maintenance, parts, and/or re-fittings—and ideally, mainte-
nance, parts, and/or re-fittings that cannot be reverse engineered or
offered by anyone else. Or that, at any rate, is what looking at US stra-
tegic interests through a US-centric lens suggests. Flip this lens around,
however, and one has to wonder what non-Western government in the
21st century would want, let alone allow, the United States to retain this
kind of dependence-inducing leverage over it?
In other words, both approaches are fraught with difficulty. Drive-by
well-digging and related practices are of fleeting value other than to help
line some locals’ pockets, while anything the United States does that is
more substantial gets the local government and security forces off the
hook of having to provide for and look out for their citizens themselves.
Such activities also give the lie to US rhetoric about respecting other
countries’ sovereignty, since if only Washington took that more seriously,
American officials would make it clear to foreign governments that it is
their sovereign duty (and not America’s job) to develop their countries
themselves, using the means at their disposal and not American taxpayer
largesse. In fact, Americans contributing anything that can be pocketed,
stolen, or skimmed does nothing but undermine sovereignty, and acts as
a solvent that both undoes and corrupts local security services.
Any assistance apart from military-to-military training, professional
military education, or military exchanges, runs counter to what is needed
to secure America’s security, which is that other countries secure theirs.
As for why militaries and not civilian agencies or nongovernmental
organizations (NGOs) should be the lead agent for Lansdalian-style
civic action, there are at least three reasons.
1. The greatest need for building mutual trust and confidence between
a government and its citizens typically occurs where insecurity has
20 According to population-centric warfare, improving people’s lives helps to keep them from
succumbing to others’ outreach and propaganda. But at least some of what US forces engage in may
amount to moral blackmail—but it does (as this author observed in Afghanistan in 2011).
AmericAn Power in TrAnsiTion Simons 43
already been rampant or where there is a history of mistrusting those
in uniform.
2. Militaries are designed to operate in austere environments and usually
possess greater logistical reach than anyone else; even inept militaries
have more equipment and can marshal more manpower than other
institutions of state.
3. Militaries are the most nationalist institutions there are, and usually
draw from all sectors and segments of society; if they do not they
should. This makes them bellwethers, which means they also offer the
fastest way for a government to prove to its citizens (and concerned
others) that it has turned over a new leaf.
As for why the United States should want to use military-to-military
training to support professionalization: this plays to US strengths. Again,
too, as Lansdale’s and Magsaysay’s success makes clear, civic action and
professionalization cost very little. Civic action is achieved through local
sweat equity, thus it aligns well with 21st century economic realities. Even
better, once Washington makes a country’s ability to demonstrate a real
civic action orientation the new requirement for receiving security sector
assistance, that assistance would no longer have to be substantive, since
here would be a government and a military that would already be working
toward being self-sustaining, which is the hallmark of professionalism.
A country’s ability to do its own civic action would also signal it has a
military and government the United States can meaningfully partner
with and a political economy Americans and others can safely invest in.
Getting from “Advisor” to “Partner”
By adopting the approach that others need to do their own heavy
lifting (while the United States technically assists), Washington would
not only free the US military from performing all sorts of aid-like func-
tions but also liberate itself from seeming to preach one thing (equality)
while doing something else (infantilizing others). As it is, when the
United States helps construct anything—except a civic action capability
in another country’s military—it creates nothing but new dependencies,
which have a sharper edge of resentment than those the Cold War once
had.
At the same time, impelling other governments to develop their
own civic action capabilities would not just arrest the corruption the
United States inevitably funds whenever the Department of Defense
undertakes or supports development projects abroad, but there is no
better nonkinetic way to compel those in power to remain responsive
to their citizens, thus mitigating the grievances that feed rebellion and
insurgency.
In this sense, civic action represents a critical capability and litmus
test rolled into one. Does the country Washington is considering as a
partner already possess a civic action capability? If so, good. If not, is it
willing to develop one? Again, governments that do not want their mili-
taries to develop a civic action capability are governments the United
States cannot effectively help—nor should it want to.
One of the few silver linings to the past decade’s worth of involve-
ment in Afghanistan and Iraq is that most US policymakers appear to